> On the east coast of Australia the biggest problem are the "grubs"
> who do not look after their hives and give AFB to neighbouring
> beekeepers. So our biggest problem is the dirty neighbour. As an
> example, one took all his "clean" hives away and left the infected
> ones on site for several months. Of course they died out and infected
> anyone who was nearby.
That definitely happens and in some cases is the main means of
transmission. There were two methods of spread mentioned -- infection
from outside and infection from within and they were -- given the size
and limits of the study -- roughly equal in impact.
The next questions in such a case where infection clearly comes from
outside, are
1.) what amount of breakdown was seen in the neighbouring 'clean' hives and
2.)what were the affected beekeepers able to do to keep from spreading
the acquired infection through their own hives.
***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html